


And Then There Were Two

by Kahika



Category: Mass Effect - All Media Types
Genre: Developing Relationship, F/M, Gen, Partnership, Sibling Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-10
Updated: 2018-09-10
Packaged: 2019-07-10 15:50:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,176
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15952559
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kahika/pseuds/Kahika
Summary: From the moment he's born, Garrus is never alone. There's no Vakarian without...





	And Then There Were Two

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Angelwingsl3 (Marie_Fanwriter)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Marie_Fanwriter/gifts).



From the moment he's born, Garrus is never alone. That's the joy of being a twin: He's part of a matched set, half of Garrus-and-Solana, always with his barely older sister in easy reach. In childhood photos, until his crest started to come in, they're nearly indistinguishable.

At first they take advantage of it, making up their own language that their parents can't understand. Being half of a pair starts to grate when they get mistaken for each other at school, and they try to go their separate ways until they they realize their strengths contrast enough to switch places for things they don't want to do. By the time they can no longer get away with twin switches, they're close again, going to each other first with any news or worries or crushes, assuming invitations and activities include the both of them.

So it's with some trepidation that they apply to different study abroad programs at thirteen, Solana already drawn to architecture and different cultures, Garrus more interested in historical battlegrounds. They both get accepted and promise to video chat every day, but Solana, whose shuttle leaves well before their mother gets hit by a skycar, is the only one who goes. Garrus calls her from the hospital ward and then from home.

They've heard of siblings in the same military units, but they start their mandatory service in different ones, catching up in person only if both their units have meals at the same time. (Sometimes they manage to find some privacy in that time, and tell each other about Solana's crush on her roommate, Garrus's irritation with his own, Solana's subsequent heartbreak when her roommate manifests biotic abilities and gets packed off to a cabal.) She ships out first as always, and though they sometimes lose contact or don't have the clearance to keep track of each other, he gets word here and there of her achievements as she makes her way into civil architecture (she always was better at letting Dad's will simply slide off of her rather than trying to fight it), and he presumes she's hearing about his rise in the hand-to-hand ranks.

It's weird being so separated from her: Even when she was on study abroad, they still had video calls or at least sent vidmail every day. As much as he likes his units, his assignments, his sparring and later 'sparring' with the flexible scout and other people, it's still a relief when they're on leave in the same place at the same time, or for long enough that they can go home. He doesn't need to see Palaven to feel right, he just needs to be in the same room as his twin sister.

At the end of their mandatory service, Solana gets scooped up by a government architecture firm on Oma Ker, and as much as he teases her about getting stomped on by the megafauna there, he could not be prouder. He eyes jobs there, but the megafauna are largely herbivorous so they don't have a lot of use for his rifle skills, his tech experience isn't the kind the colonization effort needs, and besides, his work in the military made him eligible for Spectre candidate training.

He can't bring himself to be surprised when Dad blocks his candidacy. He's an officer's son, and he was foolish to think formal citizenship would have changed that. He _is_ a little surprised when he gets to the Citadel and Dad's too busy with his C-Sec precinct to give him the time of day, let alone show him around - the Citadel's a whole new world from what he's used to, full of different species and different perspectives on a daily basis, not just in the tourist areas, and he would have thought Dad would help him out if only so he doesn't embarrass him.

It's stupid, but Garrus does not want to face this place alone. He finds an apartment with roommates (partially because he can't afford a one bedroom or even a studio on a first year C-Sec salary), but they're shuttles in the night, working while he's asleep and vice versa. He makes a few friends at work, and somehow they manage to find time between their shifts to hang out and show him the ropes of the Citadel, but he wants something more. He tries dating and is suddenly worse at it now that he can't rely on the sexual tension of sparring; Sol, when they manage to sync for video chat, laughs heartily at him every time he mentions his attempts. It doesn't help that with the notable exception of a mercenary (they agree that with their opposite jobs, it wouldn't work out), they're civilians, who haven't held a gun since mandatory service and get put off by his schedule or the things he sees at work that he sometimes needs to talk about to someone outside the force.

Shepard comes along at exactly the right time. At first he just wants to see his investigation through, but then he latches onto her, eager to work with someone unencumbered by the rules as he has been in C-Sec, intrigued to see how the military practices of other species measure up to the Hierarchy's. (Oddly, not many other people on this mix and match squad want to hear the latter; he writes this off as Tali being quarian and Wrex being krogan.) It's a little surprising to find that she's had no Spectre candidate training beyond a five minute talk with Spectre Agent Kryik, but not because of family interference like his lack of training, only because Spectre status was thrust upon her rather suddenly rather than being a career goal. Still, he thinks, watching her mercilessly gun down mercs and hang up on the Council, it means this is a completely new way of being a Spectre, not trained habits and political plays.

Which explains why she agrees with him that Citadel defense should have fired on Doctor Saleon, then follows up on his coordinates and tells him to shoot. It's the kind of justice he wanted for his mother's hit and run when he was a teenager, the kind he wanted but always got reprimanded for chasing in C-Sec, and just that little taste of it, shielded by Spectre immunity and thus free of the endless forms that would come with killing a criminal in C-Sec, is exhilarating. They don't even make it back to the ship before he's deciding to reapply for Spectre training once they beat Saren. As his gaze catches on Shepard in decontamination, he hopes she'll be his mentor.

An e-mail about his Spectre candidacy comes in a week after the Battle of the Citadel - when it's been given that name by the media, when all the awards are pouring in for the military people involved, when he's catching up with an old friend from C-Sec over drinks - and he has to get Lamont to read it for him to make sure he isn't seeing things. He buys the entire bar a round in celebration, and things get a little blurry from there: Lamont laughs at him the next day about having told everyone who'd listen and even some who wouldn't about how great it was working on the _Normandy_ and under Commander Shepard, first human Spectre, and how "gloriously ruthless" she was to her enemies and how much he hoped she'd be his mentor in the Spectres; she also applies medi-gel to the evidence of a fight he apparently got into over whether Sovereign was sentient or not.

To his surprise, he's assigned to Avitus Rix for mentorship. He doesn't tell him that his name had come up in his investigation of Saren: Rix had been recommended to the Council by Saren, and had a reputation for preferring punching to diplomacy, but he'd been distant from Saren in recent years, so Garrus had dismissed him as a potential lead. It seems his instinct was right, as Rix's rare commentary on the Battle of the Citadel and the Eden Prime War tends to focus on Saren clearly having snapped from the ruthless but not crazy Spectre he'd known.

Rix is fair, and patient where Garrus is admittedly rash, and believes him or at least doesn't argue with him about the Reapers being real (if anything, he's more reluctant to believe his stories about Saren), and shows him some neat new tricks. But in light of Saren's betrayal and the subsequent increased scrutiny for Spectres, Rix stays more within the limited lines for Spectres than Garrus would like, never questioning the Council's commands nor straying from their missions as if in a bid to prove that he's not like his former mentor. It also becomes increasingly clear as Garrus gets to know him that Rix has one foot out the door; he uses his old C-Sec skills for the smallest of investigations and finds that he's interested in that silly-sounding Andromeda Initiative he keeps seeing ads for.

It's during another round of trying to convince Rix to argue with the Council about Sovereign ("you've been a Spectre for years, they trust you, they'll believe you") that Garrus finds out that Shepard's missing in action - he hadn't seen the news this morning and doesn't tend to follow human channels, but Rix had. As Garrus stares at him, at the news vid finished on his omni-tool, and at Rix again in shock, Rix is surprisingly gentle, steering him towards a seat.

"I'm sorry," he says. "Both that it happened and that this is how you found out. I know we don't exactly talk about our personal lives, but you talk so much about her work that she meant a lot to you. If something like that happened to Macen..."

"Who?" asks Garrus, allowing himself to be distracted from the thought of Shepard, missing, probably dead.

"Someone I'm... close with," says Rix. "Take the rest of the day off."

He's still reeling as he heads out of the Embassies. His feet take him to Purgatory, and it's the middle of the day but he drinks anyway, and drinks more when he hears another news report about the death of the first human Spectre. It's what makes it seem like a good idea to go after the source on their case on his own, interrogating Kishpaugh in a back alley of the Wards.

"That was stupid," Rix says later. "As a _candidate_ , not a fully qualified Spectre, you know you're bound by C-Sec rules, rules I'm sure you're very familiar with. And yes, Spectres often work alone, but you went after him with alcohol in your system, screwing up your judgment and your reaction speed." He pauses. "You're grieving, so I'm not going to write you up for it this time, but don't do that again."

"Don't worry," he says. "I won't."

He won't because he leaves that night for Omega, following Kishpaugh's thin lead. Omega's worse than he heard and exactly what he needs, a world without law and plenty of people who need justice, a world where he can finally do some good without getting tied up in red tape.

Lantar gets that. Lantar gets _him_. Once upon a time Garrus would have thought that impossible - Lantar grew up on crime-ridden Invictus and has only ever stepped foot on Palaven for boot camp - but Garrus has worked with lots of different species now, even befriended a krogan of all aliens, so a turian from the colonies (and one of the worse ones, at that) understanding his hatred of injustice is perfectly fine.

Lantar is at his side as he begins Archangel. He teaches him all about Omega (the gangs on the Citadel, Garrus understood, but the power dynamics on Omega are different). He grows into a competent and _confident_ second in command, able to judge the different perspectives, advantages, and disadvantages of any given strategy. He manages to talk down their teammates who want to leave and live comfortably after they start actually making money, and then to talk down Garrus when he gets frustrated by this. In this world so far away from anything he's ever known, Lantar is the person he trusts most, solid and reliable, a partner in a way that Rix or Shepard, both above him in the chain of command, could never be without him completing his Spectre training.

Sidonis (he no longer deserves the intimacy of his first name, even in his head) is the last person Garrus expects to betray him and get the team killed.

He's never believed in Heaven, but when he sees Shepard, he wonders if he might be there. (It does not escape him that his ideal afterlife would include her.) Though he's not, being back under her command and not being the one giving orders is a relief after his disastrous attempt at taking the lead. Plus, he feels like Shepard treats him as more of an equal now, something to do with him being one of only a handful of familiar and friendly faces and the only familiar face on the squad (until Tali eventually joins them), or perhaps something to do with him having led his own squad like she has.

It means he's not afraid to call her out on doing things differently now. Miranda said that she and her team brought back Shepard exactly the way she was but Shepard doesn't have the same scars any more and she doesn't make the same choices she would have - the same choices _he_ would have - opting instead to try and talk people down before shooting them, not daring to risk innocent lives.

"I don't think it's anything Miranda did," Shepard reflects, gazing at him with her hands wrapped around a mug of that dark human drink (that, at least, hasn't changed). "I think it's just... Coming back was kind of a wakeup call. Not everyone's going to get this second chance I got, and I've been speeding people along to the end of their first chance. I want to do better this time - _be_ better. I went into the military for revenge, and I definitely got it, but maybe the better revenge is just... Living the life they wanted to take away from me."

"You _did_ have your life taken away from you," he points out, and she winces. "And now you're going after the things that took it."

"I'm going after the Collectors to make sure they can't kill anyone else," she says. "Not out of revenge. What about you?"

 _Avenging you,_ he does not say. _Because you took me in again and that was better than being alone after losing my squad. Because I needed something to focus on._ All he says is "Same," and he contemplates this conversation more over the following days, but when he finally gets a lead on where Sidonis disappeared to, simply living and going onto another species' suicide mission, even with someone he respects as much as Shepard, is not good enough revenge for eleven lives, a team, a mission, a home.

At least, he thinks that, as they fight their way through Blue Suns (of _course_ they didn't take them all out in the Archangel base) and mechs, as he goes to shoot Harkin for helping Sidonis and for just being an ass (he _never_ liked him, even back in C-Sec), as Shepard stops him from shooting and he resorts to a headbutt in the krogan style (saving the heat of his anger for Sidonis), as he forces himself to sleep for the noon rendezvous, right up until he has Sidonis in his sights and Shepard in his earpiece. Sidonis looks like shit, and from what Shepard's reporting, feels like it, which is exactly what he deserves. Maybe he already has his revenge.

"Maybe," Shepard suggests in the skycar afterwards, "he'll do something good after this, now that you've given him a second chance."

"What, like you?" he asks incredulously, and Shepard nods, though she doesn't take her eyes off the sky. "I'll believe it when I see it. Anyway, I said I didn't want to talk about it."

"One more thing, and then I'm done too," she says. "And you don't even need this from me, but I'm proud of you."

He's startled to realize that she's right. She's been treating him more like an equal but now he's really _feeling_ it, not craving a mentor's validation like he'd wanted from her back in '83 so much as he's interested in a partner's opinion like he is with Solana (or was, before the thought of speaking to her with the physical evidence of his failure on his face became too much to bear). Yet he doesn't see her as a sister like Solana, either, more like -

Someone to relieve tension with, he thinks dizzily, when he tells the story idly and Shepard is, of all things, receptive. But at the same time, someone he trusts enough to follow on a _second_ suicide mission, someone he likes and respects, someone he cares about, someone he is much more concerned about getting things _right_ with than he was with the flexible scout. Someone who gets only more appealing the more he gets to know her in an effort to prepare.

Someone who manages to blow his mind (who knew that what looked so weird in the porn vids would feel so good?), then to get him through the Omega-4 Relay and the Collector Base and back again, then to be unexpectedly sweet and gentle with him as they get the ship and her crew back in order. He was prepared for it to be a one time, last hurrah before the suicide mission thing; he was not prepared for her to still invite him upstairs with her, to snuggle with him, to help him out while simultaneously teasing him about the arm he broke on the Collector Base.

Nor was he prepared for how furiously worried he is about her when she goes on a mission from Hackett alone. His relief when she gets back is overwhelming, but it's quickly taken over by more worry as she confesses what happened, and then when she decides to turn herself in.

"I can't stand the thought of you all alone there," he says.

"I won't be alone," she says, with a grim smile. "I'll have a guard the whole time."

"You won't have me," he clarifies.

"I've been without you before," she points out gently. "And you've been without me. When I get out, I'll come find you."

And with that and a kiss, he's back on Palaven for the first time in three years, back with his entire family for the first time in longer, but he feels more alone than he had as the only turian on a mostly human ship: Solana is so exhausted from caretaking that she feels like a different person now, and he's definitely a different person from playing vigilante and then a suicide mission, and their two puzzle pieces no longer fit together as effortlessly as they did when they were kids. Even Dad's too worried about Mom to fight, and Mom...

Mom doesn't know who he is most days, the markings reminding her of Dad's family but the scars throwing her off.

"I can't even blame her," says Solana, lighting up in the hospital docking bay. "You come back here after months with only the odd, vague text chat, with your arm in a cast and your face mangled, and _I_ barely recognized you."

"You're one to talk," he says, waving her smoke away from his face with his good arm. "Since when do you smoke?"

"I don't know," she says. "Maybe since the doctors suggested palliative care for the first time and I was the only one there."

Garrus thinks for a moment, imagining how that must have felt, and then says, "Tell me what happened."

"No," she says. "You tell _me_ what happened. I'm pulling older twin rank, because I got this cigarette off-world when Mom went for that trial, and I intend to enjoy it."

Haltingly at first - letting Sidonis go had not made sharing this any easier - and then in a flood of words, he tells her: Rix's brief Spectre candidate training, his decision to go to Omega, Archangel from its lofty goalled start to its devastating end, Cerberus, Shepard. He lingers here, and she laughs and teases him about Shepard clearly being more than blowing off steam to him ("and a _Spectre_ , Garrus, really? Dad's gonna kill you"), then steers him back onto talking about the Collectors. He'd forgotten how good a listener she is, asking the right questions and making the right reactions but also giving him space to let it all out when he needs to.

When he's out of words and she's finished her cigarette, she tells him her side of things since he stopped calling except for that brief text chat right before the Omega-4 Relay, of quitting her job to look after Mom, of how most days she's too tired to sketch out the ideas that being in old or alien hospitals gives her and how much that kills her, of having to persuade Dad alone to come home, of how much she worried about him when his contact with her got sporadic and increasingly, seemingly unnecessarily secure.

"It made me wish I _did_ have those stupid twin things people always used to ask us about, the mind reading, or knowing when you were hurt," she says. "Because at least I'd have _some_ idea."

He hugs her. He'd hugged her when he first got back, but this is different, longer, more like they used to. "I'm sorry I put you through that," he says. "I wasn't thinking."

"You never were the thinking twin," she points out, but she hugs him back. "I'm just glad you're home."

They fall back together, Solana more helpful as his broken arm and face heal, him more understanding of her moodiness (and less nagging about her smoking). When he falters in his eulogy at Mom's funeral, she steps up and finishes it from his notes. When he finally secures some token government funding for a task force to defend against the Reapers and she barely feels turian without the focus of caretaking nor a job, he tells her about the buildings that need strengthening, and she's all over it. They're twins; they've always made a good team.

Except in combat. Even when they were kids, Solana was better at insults where he was better at punching; in the military, she saw less action, focused more on designing bases and encampments. When the Reapers make it into the system, he gets called to Menae. The comm lines there are too necessary and on Palaven too _bombed_ to try and stay in contact, and as busy as they keep him now that he's the species' expert on Reapers, it feels like a part of him is missing.

And then Shepard shows up, and he feels like part of a different whole, back in the partnership they'd developed last year. He talks about his romantic skills, and she raises an eyebrow, amused, and points out it's been six months without contact, and they'd said nothing about romance before that, and that's when he realizes how hard he's fallen for her, how quickly and intensely he's leapt into being half of their pair after being on his own on Menae. She doesn't, however, deny the romance, only his skills, so he tries to focus on that, on building their relationship into what they both want and need from each other now: Support, not just sex.

Seeing her with her gun pointed at a friend on top of Shalmar Plaza makes his heart leap into his chest, and maybe that's on her mind too when she agrees to being a one turian woman afterwards, and when she finally says she loves him. Atop the Presidium, he accidentally makes a reference to the weird looking kids they'd have and she grins and says, "Slow down there, big guy," but she doesn't back out of the relationship or down from his bottle shooting challenge.

(It's his favorite place on the Citadel less for beating her at shooting - she was never a sniper - and more for being a turning point in their relationship.)

"There's no Shepard without Vakarian," he says, much later, and this time she agrees, no slowing down or denials. It almost works both ways, except he can be Vakarian with Vakarian too, and always was long before he tried to be Vakarian with Rix or Sidonis. "And there's no Vakarian without my girls," he attempts. "I miss Sol."

"When we're done here," Shepard says, in a moment of optimism on par with his beach retirement fantasy, "I can't wait to meet her."

He's never been Vakarian with Shepard _and_ Vakarian at the same time, and he wants to be, when this is all over.

**Author's Note:**

> You know what's weird? I headcanoned Garrus and Solana being twins well before the Ryder twins were announced. I felt seen!


End file.
